"UNTIL ONE HAS LOVED AN ANIMAL, PART OF THEIR SOUL REMAINS UNAWAKENED"
He is your friend, your partner, your defender, your dog. You are his life, his love, his leader. He will be yours, faithful and true, to the last beat of his heart. You owe it to him to be worthy of such devotion.
-Unknown

Winston, golly, can I relate to this. The night before Silk had the op for bladder stones I stayed awake a lot of the night thinking what if she has a tumour as well, or what if the elevated numbers mean renal failure, or what if she dies under the anaesthetic, or gets an infection ..... . It's impossible not to worry. They're our kids. We all that it's not cancer.
Just a suggestion, you have a lovely garden, is there some work you can get into out there? It might make the wait a tiny bit less stressful.

"UNTIL ONE HAS LOVED AN ANIMAL, PART OF THEIR SOUL REMAINS UNAWAKENED"
He is your friend, your partner, your defender, your dog. You are his life, his love, his leader. He will be yours, faithful and true, to the last beat of his heart. You owe it to him to be worthy of such devotion.
-Unknown

"UNTIL ONE HAS LOVED AN ANIMAL, PART OF THEIR SOUL REMAINS UNAWAKENED"
He is your friend, your partner, your defender, your dog. You are his life, his love, his leader. He will be yours, faithful and true, to the last beat of his heart. You owe it to him to be worthy of such devotion.
-Unknown

"UNTIL ONE HAS LOVED AN ANIMAL, PART OF THEIR SOUL REMAINS UNAWAKENED"
He is your friend, your partner, your defender, your dog. You are his life, his love, his leader. He will be yours, faithful and true, to the last beat of his heart. You owe it to him to be worthy of such devotion.
-Unknown

Instead of feeding fresh salmon you can also use salmon oil. I use Jamieson Wild Salmon Oil 1000mg capsules that you can get from grocery stores or drug stores. London Drugs often has Jamieson vitamins on sale for 40% off, so I pick them up in bulk! Split the caps and squeeze onto the food. It will take some practice to not squirt the oil everywhere. You can use 2-4 times the recommended dose for treatment (rather than maintenance). Maintenance is about 1000 mg per 25 lbs body weight. You have to build up kinda slowly or he will get diarrhea.

Oh my, I am so sorry that your boy has this horrible disease. I am sending lots of healing hugs and prayers your way. patti
Sasha told me to tell you she is sorry too for Winston and sends wet kisses to you and Winston.

Awww Cindy,I really,really was hoping,together with all the others that Winston would be ok...I am so very sorry
After you losing Tabitha last year,I certainly hope Winston can hang in there,but that he's not in pain...beautiful choclate Winston

I appreciate all of the kind words from everyone. Now that I have calmed down a bit here is what we know.

Winston has an aggressive high grade Stromol Tumor. This info is based on the needle aspiration only. We could have biopsy it but it would only give me the name and basically everything else would be the same…he does have Cancer. Basically we can try to deal with removing it and chemo etc but the vet honestly doesn’t think it would benefit Winston in the long run as it will return. And he wasn’t sure he could make it through the surgery as it would be a large amount to remove. It would require a specialized surgeon to try to remove it as it has attached to the wall and cells around the area behind his shoulder. It will continue to grow.

As for Winston it really boys down to quality of life and he is fine at this time. As the vet said it is aggressive so we will have to take it day by day right now. He assured me that it is not causing Winston any pain at all and it is not affecting his major organs. It’s almost as if it will continue to grow almost externally if that makes sense?? It grows by producing fluids and with cancer cells they grow exponentially. The only concern was that it could spread around and into the chest cavity so we will have to monitor its growth.

Winston’s blood work came back perfect so there was no concern there at all.

Basically the vet said his only recommendation at this point would be to make sure Winston is happy and don’t make a lot of changes, if he wants to eat more give it to him, watch the tumor and make sure it doesn’t get bumped or hit on something, be very gentle with it when drying him off, he also recommended thick bedding so that when he lays on it its soft. Other than that he said to continue doing what we are doing to keep Winston happy and see how things go.

We have been swimming lately and I can see how much it makes Winston happy so we will be spending some more time swimming…the vet said it was okay!

My main concern was pain and he hasn’t showed any major signs so we will take it one day at a time.

Thanks for all of the support. It’s nice to know Winston has so many admirers! He sends his slobbery kisses right back to you all!!

"UNTIL ONE HAS LOVED AN ANIMAL, PART OF THEIR SOUL REMAINS UNAWAKENED"
He is your friend, your partner, your defender, your dog. You are his life, his love, his leader. He will be yours, faithful and true, to the last beat of his heart. You owe it to him to be worthy of such devotion.
-Unknown

Does the vet know why Winston was panting a lot? Without an ultrasound the vet doesn't actually know that the tumor hasn't already gone into the body cavity, does he? When you posted tumor on his shoulder and panting I was worried that it had already invaded his chest. I really hope not.

I guess it depends how much money you want to spend...you could try a lot of naturopathic treatments, but they do get rather expensive.

Myka your absolutely right we dont know for sure that it hasnt already gone in there. Without an ultra sound , biopsey or chest x ray we wont. I already know its not good just from the aspiration. I have to factor his age into whether he could handle the surgury and I dont know for sure and neither does the vet. He said it would require removing an extensive amount due to its size. I honestly do think its in the chest already because his changes have been quiite drastic this past year but I have always chalked it up to part of the aging process and to some extent it has been. He has slowed down dramatically this past yr. He has lost 15 lbs although I cant really see it the numbers are there??

All in all no not good news at all but I have to stay strong for my boy and he will tell me when its time. He is my soul dog......

"UNTIL ONE HAS LOVED AN ANIMAL, PART OF THEIR SOUL REMAINS UNAWAKENED"
He is your friend, your partner, your defender, your dog. You are his life, his love, his leader. He will be yours, faithful and true, to the last beat of his heart. You owe it to him to be worthy of such devotion.
-Unknown

I'm not sure what kind of financial situation you're in, but maybe you could do an ultrasound to find out how entwined the tumor is, and if it has invaded within his body cavity or not. If it is not too entwined, and isn't in the body cavity then maybe removal would be an option? In the meantime you could be aggressive with naturopathic treatments and supplements. Of course, all this would be rather expensive - thousands. Do you have pet insurance? I wish Pet's Best was offered in Canada.

I find what is happening to Winston very touching as I had just gone through medical trauma with my girl, Jasmine. And at this time, the best advice I can give you is to spend time with Winston. And to let Winston's actions guide you during this time.

I'm sending out lots of hugs for you both, and pray that you stay strong. From reading your posts I can tell that you are a very caring person. Winston You are doing a great job <3

__________________
RIP Jasmine and Missy.

Jasmine (2011) you were the sweetest thing in my life. The most loyal animal I could have ever asked for. Thank you for being there with me every step of my undergraduate education.

Missy (October 2008) the most beautiful dog in the world. You carried me through my high school years and I thank you for that.

Give Winston a big smooch from me. I will meet you on Sunday for sure with one of the guys. DH is going to try to fix his vehicle to accomodate the furkids. If he can get it done, he will bring one of the other guys.

No pet insurance here....I agree an ultrsound will show us that but even the vet agreed that the tumor is so large and the location (behind the shoulder blade) it would be difficult to close the wound and it will only come back. He mentioned removal would require a special surgeon as the tumor is quite large. Most importantly Winston may not handle it well considering his age.

Sylvie we will be there and I cant thank you enough for always being there MF!!

"UNTIL ONE HAS LOVED AN ANIMAL, PART OF THEIR SOUL REMAINS UNAWAKENED"
He is your friend, your partner, your defender, your dog. You are his life, his love, his leader. He will be yours, faithful and true, to the last beat of his heart. You owe it to him to be worthy of such devotion.
-Unknown